The economic fallout from the Japanese disaster could increase the global demand for gas. |
AP Photo
Close

In the same article, Thomas D. O’Malley, chairman of oil refinery partner PBF Energy Co., said: “Nuclear, it’s toast. Who’s going to sign a permit today? Absolutely no one after this disaster.”

John Pinkerton, chairman and chief executive officer of Texas-based natural gas company Range Resources, told POLITICO that the Japanese crisis is highlighting nuclear power’s dangers in the same way that last year’s BP spill called attention to the risks of deepwater oil drilling.

Text Size

-

+

reset

Compared with the potentially worldwide impact of a nuclear accident, any pollution arising from a natural-gas accident “is pretty localized,” said Pinkerton, whose company uses fracking to extract gas from shale deposits in states such as Pennsylvania and Texas. He said he expects the gap between gas and nuclear to widen even further in the aftermath of the Fukushima Daiichi disaster.

“Because of what’s happening in Japan, people are going to say we need more safeguards [with nuclear],” Pinkerton said. “And so the cost of that source of energy, I think, is going to increase pretty dramatically in the case of new builds.”

Range Resources has shared in the post-quake natural gas boom, with its stock price up roughly 14 percent since March 10, as of Wednesday afternoon. The company also won a victory on the fracking front Tuesday, when Texas regulators said EPA was wrong to blame the company for contaminating families’ drinking water wells.

In recent years, natural gas and nuclear power have both contended as potential climate-friendlier replacements for coal in electric power generation, with at least grudging acceptance from some environmental groups. Nuclear power’s advantages include the fact that reactors produce few, if any, carbon emissions, while its downsides include high expenses and the lack of any U.S. strategy to store the radioactive leftovers. Gas, meanwhile, can boast of abundant domestic supplies and low costs, plus emissions that at least are significantly cleaner than coal’s.

“With nuclear, the reward is high but the risk is high,” Pinkerton said. “With natural gas, the rewards are not as high because it’s a hydrocarbon, but on the other end of it the risk is substantially less.”

Moglen, from Friends of the Earth, argues that both energy sources belong in the past as “20th-century” fuels, compared with 21st-century alternatives such as solar, wind and increased energy efficiency. He adds that as far as public opinion is concerned, the threat of fracking chemicals appearing in drinking water in the U.S. is just as alarming as the radioactive contamination showing up in Japanese food and tap water.

But the political debate in Washington may be driving in a different direction. President Barack Obama has championed both natural gas and nuclear power — along with solar, wind, efficiency and “clean” coal — in his call for a clean energy strategy. And attempts to impose EPA regulation on fracking were already facing tough sledding in a Congress dominated by talk of loosening rules and expanding domestic energy supplies.

The latest regulation proposal is the so-called FRAC Act that Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) and Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) reintroduced last week. Similar proposals have floundered in the past two Congresses, said Travis Windle, a spokesman for the Marcellus Shale Coalition. He predicted a similar outcome this time, regardless of how the Japanese crisis ends.

“I don’t think this will in any material way affect the FRAC Act moving through Congress or getting its first-ever committee meeting,” Windle said. “It wasn’t going to happen anyway.”

Gas critics say the need remains urgent to rein in the industry’s risks, especially the dangers of drinking-water pollution tied to the extraction technique known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. Controversy has swelled in the past couple of years over the practice, which got a starring role in the movie “Gasland.”

Thousands of wells are drilled each year and there is only one incident where this technique has been shown to have contaminated well water. No one was harrmed and the people involved were compensated to their satisfaction for damages.

The movie Gasland contains several clips showing flaming faucets and accusations that this was caused by natural gas drilling. These cases have been proven to be caused by naturally occuring methane from coal beds that had no connection to natural gas drilling. The film purposely distorts the facts and has an agenda to attack natural gas.

The fracking technique involves drilling through impermeable rock thousands of feet below any water reservoirs and the drilled holes near the surface are encased in cement sealing them from any leakage. The most serious problems have come from improper storage of fracking chemicals and spillage at the sites.

The EPA, state regulatory organizations have monitored fracking for the 60 years of its usage and have consistently and invariably found it to be very safe. The success of recent drilling due to horizontal drilling combined with fracking is now a threat to those who hope to continue to profit from the politics of "alternative" energy. The clean abundant supplies of natural gas worldwide offer a clean affordable and 250 year long supply of energy. Those who profit from the man made warming industry either directly or with political support instead of embracing an obvious solution to the problem they propose exists see it as a threat.

The object of those profiting from the man made warming industry is to preserve the problem they say exists and attack any sensible solution that works. Only "solutions" that are incapable of fixing their beloved "problem" are acceptable to those who live off the "problem".

It is dificult to imagine how development of natural gas which has seen a ten-fold increase in the last ten years and is the basis for a worldwide paradigm shift in worldwide energy can be evaluated as having been given a "reprieve" by the tragedy which occured in Japan.

Somehow the energy revolution that is in process is minimized and pretended to be dependent on the political future of nuclear for it's existence. A little review of facts would be in order. The US has evolved from a position ten years ago where it was deemed to be more and more dependent on foreign imports for supply, to being 100% independent and in the position where there will be exports of natural gas rather than the past projected large import requirement. The EIA information branch of the DOE projects a 250 year worldwide supply of this pollution free energy source. Rather than hail this energy which, as opposed to wind and solar, can dramatically decrease carbon emissions, natural gas is bemoaned as an obstacle to the goals of this administration.

Since clean air and reduced carbon emissions are not the goal, the question is begged what, other than political pork; are exactly are the goals of this administration?

Yeah, keep up the Republican spin about the great track record of fracking. I noticed that no mention is made of the Cheney behind-the-scenes, sweetheart deals with energy producers and chemical companies excluding public oversight or environmentalists. Cheney allowed these corporations to literally write the nation's energy policy behind closed doors and then fought through multiple layers of courts to keep their dirty deeds from the taxpayers. Consequently, these corporations made record profits as Americans suffered.

Oversight went by the board as the Mineral Mangement Service was corrupted and MMS inspectors were literally in bed with oil producers and allowed them to write their own inspection reports in pencil, later re-copied in ink by MMS. Consequently, BP/Halliburton/TransOcean and Deepwater Horizon gave us the worst environmental disaster in American history with workers dead for quick profit, thousands of jobs lost, businesses, beaches closed, and pollution that is still out there expanding the Gulf's dead zone and polluting the region. Had the ocean floor at 5,000 feet collapsed or the wellhead broken through in other spots, the gushing oil, which the industry lied about as usual, would have been a permanent source of pollution poisoning the Gulf and eventually brought by the Gulf Stream up the East Coast.

We now know that Halliburton, (Cheney was the former CEO and gave them no-bid contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan with waste, fraud, and abuse), was given a sweetheart deal with natural gas fracking and cementing operations excluding them from EPA regulations regarding groundwater pollution which has definitely happened in Pa. Consequently, nearby Maryland has a two-year moratorium on fracking despite Republican legistlator objections.

For the poorly-educated, Republicans have historically NEVER represented the working class but the wealthy and rich corporations (like the polluting Koch Industries also given a Bush-Cheney sweet deal with dropped EPA-levied fines for benzene pollution, etc) who fund their corrupted politics with harmful results to people and the environment.

Their first priority during the Bush Great Recession (as opposed to the Republican-Hoover Great Depression) was the continued, non-jobs-creating 10-12 year tax cuts for the filthy rich (which would have balanced all or most of the state budgets) while cutting programs for the poor. They are morally-bankrupt, liars, and con-artists who have sold their souls for money. Fortunately, there is indeed a God and we will all get a chance to tell it to the Judge. No GOP spin will save you and wealth will become a burden just as Jesus said.

Democrats do not need to demonize Republicans, their actions speak for themselves.

“Though activist campaigns are garnering increasing public interest in the fracking process, two points remain unchanged: its decades-long safety record and its role in America’s prosperity” “Environmental and health studies have been conducted for years showing no linkage between fracking and drinking water contamination”

After postponing a hydraulic fracturing (aka “fracking”) hearing slated for upstate New York last week, EPA is planning a new event which reports suggest could turn into a full two-day spectacle sometime in September. Though activist campaigns are garnering increasing public interest in the fracking process, two points remain unchanged: its decades-long safety record and its role in America’s prosperity/ So why all the hype and fervor over a reliable technique that has been around since 1947?

For those that don’t know, fracking is a technique which uses water pressure to create fractures in rock that allows extraction of oil and natural gas. Those who work in the energy industry are rightfully worried that efforts to curb this critical process will also eliminate their jobs. As high unemployment persists — over 7.7 million US jobs lost since the recession began in December 2007 — and the economy struggles to rebound, development of America’s natural gas resources is bringing new investments to communities across the country. In addition to the economic benefits, it is also essential in providing America clean natural gas which fuels public transportation and helps reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Developing jobs and clean sources of energy are just some of the reasons people are so passionately supportive of hydraulic fracturing.

Yet, some activist groups are singling out the technique in a scramble to blame corporations for poisoning our drinking water. While the fracking process uses chemicals, these claims are unfounded to say the least. The ingredients used in hydraulic fracturing include a small dose of chemicals (0.5%) mixed with water and sand (99.5%). Environmental and health studies have been conducted for years showing no linkage between fracking and drinking water contamination. In a 2004 comprehensive report conducted by EPA itself, federal researchers concluded:

In its review of incidents of drinking water well contamination believed to be associated with hydraulic fracturing, EPA found no confirmed cases that are linked to fracturing fluid injection into CBM wells or subsequent underground movement of fracturing fluids. Further, although thousands of CBM wells are fractured annually, EPA did not find confirmed evidence that drinking water wells have been contaminated by hydraulic fracturing fluid injection into CBM wells.

If the EPA study were not enough to vindicate the fracking process, common sense should. Natural gas formations are thousands of feet below drinking water aquifers so for contamination to occur the fracking solution would have to move through multiple layers of rocks. This would only happen however if the rocks were extremely porous, yet if this were the case the natural gas reservoir would have never existed in the first place. The natural gas would have leaked naturally to the surface over the course of millions of years.

....and the evil Halliburton has developed a fracking solution comprised of 100% food grade ingredients which is conveniently and consistently ignored by those who strive to restrict domestic energy sources with unfounded scare stories.

Other than being involved in the psuedo "alternative" industry or blind partisanship, it is hard to understand why anyone would object to pollution free energy that cuts carbon emissions in half. These same individuals support wind and solar which are useful as pork projects but completely incapable of reducing pollution or carbon emissions by any measurable amount.

Since the adminstration rejects energy that cleans the air, is affordable and is available in abundance it is hard to imagine. other than support for pork projects, what their motives might be. Pork projects is the least offensive explanation for this unacceptable choking off of domestic energy.

Dahun-Quoting the Republican-conservative Forbes propaganda--no bias there, armchair activist. Try thinking and writing for yourself. Attend college, serve in the military, serve your country or your God in any way? Noticed that you were unable to challenge the long list of factual information provided. I guess, Neitzsche was current, "Conviction is a greater adversary of the truth than a lie."

Haliquila, I realize that facts and common sense have no place in your far left world.

I am sorry that you object to me reporting facts which support my positions. I also note that you have not posted anything but old rhetoric which you cannot support with factual references.

My objective is to post my opinions and back them up with facts. I assume your objection to my posting articles showing how the EPA records prove there has been no ingress of fracking fluids into wells or drinking water reservoirs and details that show this is highly unlikely or eevn impossible.

I have learned that trying to use logic and intelligent conversation with some of the more radical posters such as yourself tends not to elevate the conversation, but bring it down to the lowest level. Please feel free to post your "ideas"; I will continue to present my opinons and facts. I would like to respond to any factual information you may have.

Superfund Sites in America, most of which are created by oil, coal, energy producers and chemical companies who NEVER pay all the costs of their pollution.

As of November 29, 2010, there are currently 1,280 sites listed on the National Priority List, an additional 347 have been delisted, and 62 new sites have been proposed.[23]

Approximately 70 percent of Superfund cleanup activities historically have been paid for by parties responsible (PRPs) for the cleanup of contamination. The only time cleanup costs are not borne by the responsible party is when that party either cannot be found (goes bankrupt, my note) or is unable to pay for the cleanup. For those sites, the Superfund law originally paid for toxic waste cleanups through a tax on petroleum and chemical industries. The chemical and petroleum fees were intended to provide incentives to use less toxic substances. Over five years, $1.6 billion was collected, and the tax went to a trust fund for cleaning up abandoned or uncontrolled hazardous waste sites. The last full fiscal year in which the Department of the Treasury collected the tax was FY1995. At the end of FY1996, the invested trust fund balance was $6.0 billion. This fund was exhausted by the end of FY2003; since that time funding for these orphan shares has been appropriated by Congress out of general revenues. (ie. taxpayers, my note).

In brief, not only are these companies getting big tax subsidies and breaks, litigation protection, EPA exemptions, failure to collect oil leasing revenues, failure to utilize existing land leases (25 million acres) while trying to acquire more and national and overseas business promotion. remember that 46% of American corporate profits are generated overseas there they have no allegiance to America just profit over peopel and the environment. When natural gas can be developed via fracking honestly without the standard corporate lies and coverups, then it can be considered as a viable alternative. Unfortunately, these companies who have the worst track records of pollution, are not the most reliable source for truth as the BP oilwell blowout is just the latest example.

Hi workinman. Still the cowardly troll I see. I keep hoping you will grow up and try to post something intelligent, but once again your sycophantic allegiance to president Obama prevents you from doing anything but keep spitting at me.

Superfund Sites in America, most of which are created by oil, coal, energy producers and chemical companies who NEVER pay all the costs of their pollution.

...is a conversation irrelevant to the issue at hand and can only be an admission on your part that you have given up trying to discuss natural gas. Attempting to connect fracking with Superfund sites is a proposition that begs explanation.

more lies? I think President Obama has done a terrible job of following up on many of his campaign promises, like transparency in government, accountability for those who have commited crimes, stopping rendition, his administrations terrible treatment of gov't whistle-blowers, the criminal mismanagement of the dept of the interior which I feel could have prevented the BP oil spill, I could go on, but what's the point, you'll just come with another right wing hate smear to hurl at me.

you're the one saying we should take whatever haliburton says at face value and Hallaquila is pointing out that these companies have a long history of lying to protect their financial interests even when their negligence have resulted in sickness and death!

more lies? I think President Obama has done a terrible job of following up on many of his campaign promises, like transparency in government, accountability for those who have commited crimes, stopping rendition, his administrations terrible treatment of gov't whistle-blowers, the criminal mismanagement of the dept of the interior which I feel could have prevented the BP oil spill, I could go on, but what's the point, you'll just come with another right wing hate smear to hurl at me.

So you realize that Obama is corrupt, has no energy policy other than to spend hundreds of billions on pork projects, has adopted all of Bush's war policies, started a third oil war, has quadrupled deficits, spent TARP money that by law should have gone to pay down the debt, is intentionally choking off energy supplies and forcing imports, wasted a trillion dollars of Stimulus money on bloating government and is the worst president in 100 years displacing Jimmy Carter.

...is a socialist that has taken over banks and car companies to rescue union benefits, is attempting to nationalize healthcare while granting 2000+ exemptions on a friends of Obama basis, keeps moratoriums on place for offshore drilling in the US and pledges $50 billion in eventual loans to Brazil and tells them that we will be good customers for their foreign oil? Pushes for wind, solar and ethanol that are useless to clean the air and as energy sources while choking off all domestic energy? ...and has his entire life surrounded himself with far-left socialists and communists including many of his czars and cabinet members.

you're the one saying we should take whatever haliburton says at face value and Hallaquila is pointing out that these companies have a long history of lying to protect their financial interests even when their negligence have resulted in sickness and death!

Nonsense. There is not a single death or sickness that has been tied to fracking in 60 years. Why do liberals find it so easy to say things they know aren't true?

We need to forego political demagoguery and actually come up with a workable plan to liberate the United States from the shackles of foreign energy imports. At least from countries that don't like us, because we only have access to 2% of the worlds oil reserves and we consume 25%, so in order to free ourselves we have to have a reduction in oil consumption no matter what. Shale oil is basically a rock that has to be fracked and mined and then have the oil extracted from it, that process burns a lot of energy and oil to accomplish, giving the process an ROEI of almost one to one; you burn a gallon of oil to get a gallon of oil, making shale oil basically useless....Natural gas could be a good transitional fuel because we could convert gasoline burning delivery fleet trucks without too much trouble, however it will be an added expense to businesses so we'll almost certainly have to give them tax breaks, also known as subsidies. Hybrids and electrics hold great promise for urban commuters and as more are sold and developed the price will come down and the need for tax breaks ( subsidies ) will decrease over time. Volkswagon TDI diesel technology has consistently been way ahead of the curve compared to other fossil fuel burning vehicle efficiency. They can actually rival or exceed some hybrids! I mention these because they all achieve the goal of lowering oil consumption. We don't know all of the consequences from fracking for natural gas, the "Haliburton Exemption" needs to go so we know what's happening and where. I am also very intrigued and excited by the possibility that thorium fueled nuclear reactors which produce 99% less waste than uranium, could provide safe clean power for a thousand years with the fuel available inside of the United States. In addition, thorium reactors can't melt down, the little waste they do produce has a half life of 200 years, instead of 200,000, and can actually burn our current stockpiles of nuclear waste! Harry Reid should be trying to build the first thorium reactors in Nevada, thereby killing two birds with one stone. As I have said before; We need to pull together as Americans instead of being pulled apart by politicians.